Party in a geriatric ward

The doddering comrades refuse to allow a generational shift in leadership, making it all the more vulnerable to the youthful Opposition.

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Abhijit Dasgupta

February 11, 2010

ISSUE DATE: February 22, 2010

UPDATED: February 25, 2010 13:54 IST

The picture was worth more than a thousand words: a small sea of white tops as the leadership of the CPI(M) paid homage to their departed leader Jyoti Basu.

Communist leaders pay their last respects to Jyoti Basu

The old guard had indeed turned old: Prakash Karat, 61, Buddhadeb Bhattacharya, 66, Biman Bose, 70, and Manik Sarkar, 61, stood with clenched fists while Sitaram Yechury, more salt, less pepper, was in relatively splendid isolation. On that sad day for communists, the 57-year-old Yechury was the one exception. But he won't be for too long.

In West Bengal, natural home to the communists, the seniority of leaders is never questioned though odd apprehensions are raised at times when an otherwise active sports minister Subhas Chakraborty, 68, suddenly dies of an ailment.

Not too many were aware of when power minister Mrinal Banerjee, nursing a cancer which was spreading maliciously, succumbed in his 72th year. Not to forget the 75-year-old Speaker of the West Bengal Assembly, Hashim Abdul Halim, who fainted and was rushed to an ICU in Singapore.

The CPI(M) top brass wishes these events away as coincidences, but the fact remains that at least three top leaders of the party holding key positions in the Government are unwell: Industries Minister Nirupam Sen, Housing Minister Gautam Deb and Environment Minister Sailen Sarkar.

Voices from within

"It's unfair to say that we harbour only oldies. They have earned their positions and unless we have reasons to do so, there is no question of replacements."

--Biman BoseLeft Front chairman

"You need a service check after the guarantee period is over. You have to allow a leadership to emerge. The CPI(M) leadership does not encourage that."

--Abdur Rejjak MollahMinister for land and land reforms

"In order to govern, you need experience and that comes with age. Communists do not retire. We do not have personal aspirations."

--Abdus SattarMinister for minority affairs

In most cases, the coincidence is not the illnesses but the fact that almost the entire 43-member ministry of Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya is now ageing, with ministers around 65 years the norm than exceptions. In this, Deb stands alone; he is, indeed if that is so, young at 57.

It is this age problem which now haunts the CPI(M) as it braces itself to face the expected onslaught from a dynamic and youthful Opposition headed by Mamata Banerjee. With Assembly elections barely a year away, this could prove disastrous.

It is, after all, highly charged, energised foot soldiers, and not ageing generals, who finally have to go out and fight the war. The problem with the CPI(M) is that there are too many ageing generals while the foot soldiers seem to have been swamped by the cry for change.

The simple fact is that the West Bengal unit of the CPI(M), which in the stellar years of the 1970s produced youth icons such as Bhattacharya and now Left Front Chairman Biman Bose, can't boast of a single leader worth his mettle. Under 50, silence rules in the CPI(M) hierarchy.

Minister for Land and Land Reforms Abdur Rejjak Mollah, 68, not one to keep his mouth shut, more so after he was embroiled in the Vedic Village controversy, says, "You need a service check after the guarantee period is over. Leaders don't turn up at your door or drop from trees. You have to allow a leadership to emerge.

The CPI(M) leadership doesn't encourage that." The minister further adds, "Babur laid the foundations of the Mughal Empire when he was a teenager. But he was allowed to initiate the process of a new empire building. He was given that space by history and individuals surrounding him."

One of the younger ministers of the state, Abdus Sattar, 40, who looks after the minorities portfolio, says that age is of primary importance in governance. "In order to govern, you need experience and that comes with age.

For us communists, there is nothing called retirement and thus we can contribute our utmost till the day we physically can't. Communists do not retire. We do not have personal aspirations. Today, I may be a minister but if tomorrow the party feels I am needed elsewhere, I will go gladly."

A visit to the CPI(M) party office at Alimuddin Street in Kolkata is an eye opener. Even as you wait for Bose to sit for a cup of tea with you, and indulge in banter with the many elderly comrades passing by, the refrain is one and ubiquitous: "Communists mature only by 60. Our party is not the Trinamool that you get senior positions by virtue of influence, you have to slog for it."

Bose, sitting pretty at 70, clarifies the situation. "Look, a member has to move up through four levels: local, zonal, district and state. Such is our party structure. You can't get a berth in the state secretariat fresh from kindergarten, sorry."

Bose adds that to become a really senior member or a minister, one has to travel at least 30 years. "So, it is unfair to say that we harbour only oldies. They have earned their positions and unless we have fair reason to do so, there is no question of replacement," he says.

As for illnesses stalking the senior ranks, Bose says, "Mrinal Banerjee worked till his body could not take it. We knew about his cancer. Central Committee member Binoy Konar is pushing 80 but is still active. Subhas (Chakraborty) was extremely active even days before his death. Deb is being treated for a nerve problem. So what do we do? Just throw out these talented comrades because they are old or sick and ignore the fact that they can still put in more work than a man half their age? Sorry, but our party does not function like that."

For the generation which saw the Bhattacharyas and Boses as young men take over the mantle of power from a clueless Congress in 1977 and marshalled by a man called Jyoti Basu, who was a very spirited and sprightly 63 at that time, the gradual ageing of a generation has had its impact though.

The CPI(M) was a natural ally of the urbane middle class of Calcutta in the '70s. Three decades later, the party seems to have turned into an education of a people waiting to yank it out from the seat of power.

Debesh Roy, one of the top leftist intellectuals of the state, says that the "natural ally" feel has not gone for a toss. "Only Left sympathisers have got alternatives now in the fringe Marxists whose growth has been phenomenal. The official communists have been forsaken for the unofficial reds. That is the true picture. Bengal still remains clearly Leftist in its beliefs."

He further adds, "The official Communist Party is ageing and is becoming an anachronism, but then a large number of communists are being made in the state every day, not necessarily in the official ranks though. That's why the age factor of the CPI(M) is now being shown up. Young people wanting to be communists are going elsewhere, particularly so in the districts."

The CPI(M) has always managed to silence its detractors with statistics, however. Just like its 65-year-old Finance Minister Asim Dasgupta who manages to project the sunny side of his Government at any presentation and who was in the early '90s described by Basu as "my US-trained minister who will show you what new ideas are".

The 29-year-old state secretary of the Students' Federation of India (SFI), Kaustav Chatterjee, uses the same formula: even when facts stare you at your face indicating the opposite, show them figures to prove how wrong they are. "In 1977, the SFI had around two lakh members in the state. Today, we have 16 lakh. During the 2009 elections held in 296 colleges, we won in 183. Does this in any way suggest that we do not have young members on our rolls?"

His Kolkata District President Madhuja Sen Roy, 26, says, "Do not forget that in the middle of this consumerist surge, it's the Left government which has been voted back time and again because we have enabled the economics of the state to sustain that. It is we who have delivered."

Amid this talk of winning elections and influencing people, the Trinamool Congress march continues unabated. First-time MP and star of the Trinamool, Subhendu Adhikari, 39, who defeated Haldia strongman Lakshman Seth last time, says the ageing of the CPI(M) has made it easier for Trinamool leader Banerjee who is only 54.

"Young people are my main support. I am not fettered by chains. My response time is immediate. I am single and I can work round the clock. People realise that I have come to stay. And I do not have to take naps in the afternoon to stay alive in the evenings."

But the CPI(M) will not own up that it is headed for the geriatric ward. Newly inducted state secretariat member Rabin Deb, 61, who has lost to Banerjee twice consecutively, says it is all in the ideals.

"Mamata, too, has many leaders who are over 55 and have nothing to contribute. Issues are important, not age. Prafulla Mahanta was a rage in Assam once but he knew nothing about governance. He was a young leader. But pray, where is he now? He vanished because he had no ideals to follow."

The last word, however, comes from a CPI(M) minister himself who refused to be quoted. Apparently, one day he visited a colleague's residence and was asked to wait outside. Not the one who loves to be kept waiting, he barged inside, only to see his colleague colouring his hair. "I couldn't believe it. I had always thought that he had not greyed. I asked him why he was covering up what for me was natural."

He adds, "I never had any problems with my shock of silver. But my friend felt otherwise. Coverups are needed, he told me." The truth is too white to miss.

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